Jun 24, 2013 11:43 AM EDT By Russell Westerholm, UniversityHerald Reporter

The Supreme Court passed down an opinion on Monday regarding a University of Texas (UT) affirmative action case, the Dallas Morning News reported.

The 7-1 decision, with one justice recusing herself, found that UT had already shown a need to diversify their admissions, but still needed to prove their diligence in that goal.

"The reviewing court must ultimately be satisfied that no workable race-neutral alternatives would produce the educational benefits of diversity," Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote for the majority. "Once the University has established that its goal of diversity is consistent with strict scrutiny, the University must prove that the means it chose to attain that diversity are narrowly tailored to its goal."

The ruling also calls for other schools to become stricter about their affirmative action policies.

The complaint that sparked this case came in 2008 when Abigail Fisher sued UT for unlawfully rejecting her admission. The school has an automatic acceptance policy for students in the top 10 percent of their graduating high school class, allowing them to admit about three quarters of applicants.

Fisher, who did not reach the requirement for automatic acceptance, contended that she was denied in favor of less qualified minority students from schools not as competitive as hers. She cited the 14th Amendment of equal protection in her suit.

The case has been watched nationwide for its potential effect on colleges throughout the country. In 2003, a Supreme Court ruling allowed public universities to consider race in applications in order to gain a "critical mass" of minority students. The author of that opinion, Sandra Day O'Connor, has retired and today's court is believed to be more conservative.

NBC News described the decision as the equivalent to "a grade of incomplete" because the Supreme Court offered an opinion and not a ruling. The case is being sent back to a lower court for another review.

Justice Kennedy said the lower court should hear the case again "so that the admissions process can be considered and judged under a correct analysis."

He said the Fifth Circuit U.S. District Court of Appeals made legal errors in the original hearing and should have been more critical of UT's program.

Click here to read the decision in full.

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